


Lacuna

by leezh



Category: The Blacklist (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Siblings, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Friendship/Love, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, Protective Siblings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2013-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-05 12:22:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,839
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1093823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leezh/pseuds/leezh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Life at the Bureau shifts (again) for Liz ever since Red decided to ditch them after the whole Anslo Garrick debacle. She has been trying to deal with everything that has happened since then, including the aftermath of Ressler’s injury and her last question to Red.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lacuna

**Author's Note:**

> Lacuna. (noun)  
> An unfilled space or interval; a gap.

_A few months later~_

Life at the Bureau shifts (again) for Liz ever since Red decided to ditch them after the whole Anslo Garrick debacle. The team has been moved to a temporary blacksite and they have been reassigned with the sole task of locating and bringing Raymond Reddington alive.

The only problem is, after his last phone call, Red has totally gone radio silent on her. Liz begins to wonder if this is how it was like for Ressler all those years ago, before Red surrendered himself and demanded her to come into the equation: the whole team chasing nothing more than ghosts as Red seems to do only God knows what in a place that only God knows where.

Liz stretches her neck.

Even though she knows (somewhere on the back of her mind) that going through all of Red's known associates list and combing their files one by one will only result in nothing, she still does it anyway. Because the alternative is to catch up on her paperwork and the mere thought of doing them instead put a damper on her mood.

Her phone dings. She quickly glances at it and her heart falls just the tiniest bit as she registers Tom's message on the screen.

_'When you’ll be home?'_

Liz doesn't need to take a quick glance around to see that everyone else has disappeared and the floor has practically been deserted, save for two others beside herself. Even Meera has gone at six right on the dot, as it is one of her boys' birthday and Liz knows that the CIA agent has promised to be home early to celebrate.

Liz lets out a quiet sigh, she really does not want to go home yet. Tom has been badgering her non stop, trying to convince her to apply for a transfer so they can move away. Lately he has mastered the art of bothering her with just his constant disapproval looks and Liz almost swears that if she ever catches him throwing another miserable look at her once again, she may have to punch him out of sheer annoyance.

Wasting no more time, she quickly types in her reply. _'Still caught up at work. No need to wait up.'_

She turns off her laptop. After making sure that she has tidied up her desk and put every paper on their own respective folders, she takes a moment to savor the relative silence of the floor before she stands up, gathers her jacket, and heads out.

-

The door is opened more quickly this time, and Liz does a double take, caught off guard because she does not expect to see him answering the door himself, let alone seeing him standing there instead of sitting on his wheelchair.

"Ressler?" Liz asks just for the sake of saying something. It is his apartment alright and she is fully aware of that fact, but she has to say that she is confused (and glad too, but mostly confused) to see him being fully vertical. She registers his brand new accessory right away: a cane.

"Hey, Keen," he says, giving her only the ghost of a smile on his face, but now Liz knows that it practically means that the man is thrilled to see her. "Thought I'd give you a surprise."

"You sure did," she says, stepping in as he closes the door behind her.

She watches the way he leads her into his living room (pretty smoothly). It's obvious that this isn't the first time Ressler tries out that cane, and she wonders since when he started doing it, because she has been visiting him practically every day and she is sure that last night, he was still this grumpy person who was so damn anxious to get the hell away from his wheelchair but still trapped under orders from his doctor and physiotherapist.

Both of them cross his living room in favor of the kitchen and dining area. Liz can still see his wheelchair resting silently beside his bookshelf from the corner of her eye. "When did you start?"

“A few weeks ago,” Ressler replies as he slowly lowers himself onto his usual chair on the dining table before he rests his cane against it. "With Jackson's knowledge, of course."

Liz follows suit, taking her seat directly on his opposite. The table before them has been set for dinner and she instantly appreciates the mouth-watering smell of what appears to be parmesan chicken bake, one of her favorites, among the mashed potato and salad.

She also notices that instead of three plates as usual, there are currently only two.

Ressler must has noticed that she does too, because he explains (before she can ask), "Remember that he actually has a wife and kids? Now that I'm able to stand on my two, _okay, three_ , feet, I figure that it's finally safe to ship him back to California."

Ressler only has a younger brother left, and as soon as he heard that his older brother has been wounded in the job, Jackson had immediately flown in and ultimately stays to take care -and harass- Ressler while he is recuperating. Watching the brothers’ interaction has been the highlight of her many days, and now she is sure that she's going to miss the blonde-haired, energetic younger version of Ressler ( _Donald_ , Liz’s mind supplies, because both brothers are Resslers, of course) as much as the older's suffering expression caused by the offhand comments of the younger.

Ressler picks up his fork and motions for her to do the same. "Don't have to worry, these aren't my cooking. I only heated them up. Jackson specifically made these for you before hauling his ass to the airport."

Liz smiles. Ressler's apparent inability to correctly hold any cooking utensils (apart from huge ass knives) is one of the favorite subjects of Jackson's endless teasing, and despite his burly size and all american motorcycle gang member appearance, the younger Ressler is surprisingly a gifted cook. "I guess I'll just have to put off the worrying until tomorrow, then," she says.

Liz looks up to see Ressler raising his eyebrows slightly, but he doesn't make any comment right away.

Her occasional dinner visit has been increasing from about once a week until practically every day, but Ressler has respected her privacy enough not to say anything about it. She guesses that he gets it, that there are just some things that other people -Tom very much included- that won't and can't ever understand some aspects of their job and how fucked up they have been ever since Red entered their lives.

"I think I'll start coming in tomorrow," he announces.

Her hands pause involuntarily.

Liz tries hard not to over analyze why her initial reaction to his inevitable statement is a tinge of worry deep within her gut. She supposes that it’s justified since he’s still on the recovering stage. And _this_ , whatever habit they have been developing, just has worked out relatively well for her, as his absence from the blacksite becomes her reason to check up on him and delay the expectation of her to go home early.

And she’s just not sure that she is ready to give it up just yet.

"Are you sure that Cooper won't just kick you out?" she says instead. "He's still pissed with you for giving up the code, you know."

"Yeah," Ressler agrees. “But I almost died, also I did save his life, so at least I have a bargaining chip. Somewhat."

And that is another subject that both of them have managed to allude to but never really talk about. It’s like they have reached this silent agreement not to bring up the fact that Ressler was all prepared to die protecting Red but gave it all up for her sake, even after she had let him know that she was more than prepared too as well.

It’s not the first time he's willing to compensate for her, and she has started to _really_ notice. Gina Zanetakos. The Stewmaker. Those times with her father, Sam-

Suddenly her throat feels parched. Liz grabs for her drink.

“By the way, do you know that it’s one of Meera’s boys birthday today?” she ends up saying after taking a gulp, desperate to put a stop to her previous line of thoughts.

She just has to steer the topic back to the land of casual ground, _safe ground_ , and she allows herself to sighs internally in relief as Ressler takes the bait.

“Really?” he says before continuing, deadpan, “Finally we know something about the boys.”

Liz chuckles. None of them are really forthcoming about each of their own personal lives other than what’s listed on their official records, but Meera clearly takes the top spot for her success in separating her work life with her personal one. The reason why are obvious: Ressler simply lacks personal life (and even now, after meeting Jackson, she still stands by her opinion on this matter) and she is clearly placed firmly on the bottom as she even has Tom dragged inside the black site once.

“Yeah, finally we do.”

-

"I'm really going to miss your brother," Liz hears herself saying as she insists on doing the dishes.

(It’s the least she can do. Or at least that’s what she tells herself.)

“Jackson?" Ressler repeats, and Liz laughs at the incredulity tone in his voice. "If you mean his cooking, I can understand."

He's currently leaning on the counter, on her right, waiting for her to rinse off the plates so he can wipe them dry. Clad in worn jeans and looking perfectly at ease, Liz has to say that at that particular moment, Ressler looks good, a really far cry from the guy who she once called as 'uptight'.

How was she supposed to know that apparently, she only needs to see him outside the job to see all of these different sides of him.

Liz is suddenly aware of how the whole scene actually screams domesticity ( _okay, maybe not, if not for just a little bit - her mind can be so weird sometimes_ ), more so because Jackson isn’t around acting as their buffer anymore. The younger Ressler does keep them distracted on their happy neutral ground, keep both of them in line and prevent them from saying things they really shouldn’t.

She looks up to see Ressler staring back at her with an expression on his face that she can’t really comprehend. It’s safe to assume that he picks up on the weird mood too, and-

“You know, Keen, just leave the rest, I’ll clean them up later,” Ressler interrupts her thoughts. “It’s getting late, so, uh-“

She knows that she has to leave. Soon. Still hasn’t forgotten about Tom and the fact that he is probably fuming at home, getting impatient by the second. (Never mind that it’s probably safer for Tom if she only arrives home after he’s asleep. She just feels like she’s close to do some form of serious assault if they actually get into another argument yet again.)

But-

"He called me."

The words are already out from Liz’s lips before she can stop herself. She previously thought that telling Ressler once (when he was out cold at the hospital) would be enough, but as it turns out, she barely can contain it anymore.

She just has to tell _someone_.

And if that someone happens to be her partner-slash-supervisor which is currently on leave but will resume his duty tomorrow and will most probably give her a harsh reprimand for not reporting it on the first place? Well, Liz finds out that at that exact moment, she just does not give a damn about the consequences.

“Red, before he completely went off grid,” she reaffirms, looking up to see Ressler already has his infamous knitted eyebrows on display. She does not need years of her profiling training to see that he is not happy to hear it.

“Ressler, I-“ she pauses, “I asked him if he’s my father.”

If he is shocked by her revelation, Ressler does a pretty good job concealing his surprise under his apparent fury. She assumes that he himself has entertained that exact theory at one point or another anyway. Liz isn't sure which part is it that makes him more mad: her biological question or the fact that she deliberately concealed the exchange in the first place.

“Keen-“

“I just- I just need to know,” she reasons, fully aware that she is still trying to convince herself as much as him. “I just want the truth."

Liz knows how crazy it is for her to expect Ressler to have some kind of answers to her impossible questions just because he happened to be stuck in the damn glass box with Red that awful day. She had seen the painful-to-watch footage and there is no doubt in her mind that their exchange inside the box invoked these subtle shifts in Ressler: how he seems to be slightly less stubborn about coming in to work as soon as his doctor signed his release paper and also how he does not seem to hate Red’s guts as much as he used to, among others.

Ressler fixes her with his intense glare. "You do understand what you just did?" His gaze on her is unblinking, and it starts to get on her nerve. "Jesus, Keen, now you _have_ to write it in, or I will."

“Sorry,” she continues, though she’s not feeling sorry at all. Instead, she feels better for letting the huge cat out of the bag. "I just don’t know who to tell."

Ressler does not even pretend to question why she does not confide it all with Tom (albeit on a more vague degree). He keeps his silence for a moment as he closes his eyes and lets out what sounds like a quiet sigh.

"What did he say?"

Liz throws her gaze away. "That he's not.”

"But you don't believe him."

"No, I don't," she admits. It’s hard to tell because the phone call was made from a payphone with crap connection, but she just can’t shake the feeling that while Red may not outright lying, he definitely still holds things back from her. She considers going all out, telling Ressler about Red’s warning regarding Tom, but the thoughts of Ressler digging even more extensively into her husband (and her life with him) freaks her out more than she expects it to.

Ressler shifts. She knows that he tries not to give it away that blatantly, but his wounded leg must have started to nag on him. Before she has time to think about it, Liz has already move to help him, coming to position herself on his right with her arm wraps around his back to slightly support him just like what Jackson used to do just the night before.

He hesitates for a split second upon the contact, but he doesn’t stop her. “Sorry,” he breathes out.

Liz supports him until he reaches the sofa.

“Don’t be silly,” she says, aware that his apology serves double meaning: sorry for troubling her and sorry for disrupting their important conversation. She honestly doesn’t mind on both accounts. If anything, she is actually glad of the distraction.

Once he drops himself there, Liz automatically lifts his left leg gently.

“Thanks.”

As she stands there, she sees that Ressler already has his head lifted up to look at her, his lips parted. It’s obvious that he wants to say something.

A beat later-

His arm lifts up, and Liz soon realizes that he’s actually reaching for her hand. She lets him tug her softly downward, and she complies, coming to sit carefully beside his wounded leg.

A considerable silence follows. Ressler has his eyebrows knitted and he looks like he’s having an intense debate with himself.

After a while, he squeezes her hand gently. “Listen, Keen, uh-”

She knows that she must be fixing him a complicated form of expression that’s mixed between ‘what are you trying to say?’ and ‘please don’t tell me to leave’ and also ‘what should I do now?’, but somewhere down the line -on the weeks or months to come- she probably will take a look back on this day and smile at how adorable Ressler can be when he’s all awkward and at loss for words.

“You just- Don’t worry too much about that, can you?” he finally says. “I mean, despite everything we do, there are just those shitload of things that are out of our hands, and- Keen, you know what I’m trying to say, right?”

Liz gives him a small smile, “Yeah.”

She needs to hear that, she supposes. Just needs to be reminded. And it may be such a small thing to do, such simple comforting gesture, but she finds that it’s everything she can hold on to right now.

_And isn’t that what she precisely looks for from Ressler?_

**Author's Note:**

> To be honest, I just want Liz to visit Ressler while he's recuperating and take care of him a little bit. Plus it's a good opportunity to thrown in Jax-but-not-Jax's cameo in there somewhere, and this is the result. 
> 
> Un-beta-ed, so sorry for the mistakes, I hope it's still readable. Thanks for reading!


End file.
